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December 2015

December 29, 2015

Pretty much everyone who works retail is a sales superstar right before and after the holidays. It's the nature of the last minute shopping that happens every Christmas, and how the couple of days after Christmas have become big shopping days.

Beginning this week, customers will be back to shopping as they did before the holidays. The people coming through your door have an interest in what you sell, but they definitely have less purchase intent than they did over the last few weeks.

Not that they won't make purchases, but customers just aren't in the same buying mindset as before.

That's why it is so important not only that your staff's mindset changes, but that they get back to the proactive engagement approach they need in order to be post-holiday superstars. Here's how to make that happen.

1. Watch and listen for employees stuck in the holiday crush sales approach.

In the last week before Christmas it was easy for employees to start "helping" shoppers instead of engaging them, and it worked because the customers needed to buy something for someone. It won't work going forward. Unfortunately, sometimes people don't even realize that this is what they're doing. This is why your observation and feedback is so important.

2. Focus your Take Fives on moving beyond the holidays.

Champion the post-holiday customer experience. Remind your team how important it is to engage customers in conversation, and to proactively get products in their hands and on them. Take time to practice/role-play with each person to get her back to her superstar approach.

3. Play the Three and Three game.

Here's a fun way to get your team focused on the key back-to-the basics behaviors and actions. With the Three and Three game the goal is to learn three things about every customer, and get him or her to hold or try-on three products. Simple enough. This also gives you some specific opportunities to observe and coach your team.

So let me, will your team be post-holiday superstars?

Here’s how to use this article to impact your business

Discuss with your leadership team how quickly your staff is getting back to their post-holiday superstar ways. Discuss these three tips, and determine what actions you'll take this week to help your team deliver a more engaging and productive superstar experience.

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Doug Fleener, a proven retail and customer experience expert and speaker/consultant, helps companies dramatically improve their customer experience and their sales results. Visit the Dynamic Experiences Group website, or call Doug at 866-535-6331 to discuss how he can help you create extraordinary results. Learn about Doug's keynotes and workshops at DougFleener.com.

December 22, 2015

Beginning on Saturday morning, customers will descend on your store armed with gift cards, cash, and a strong desire to buy for their favorite person, themselves. At the same time many of them will also be carrying gifts to return and/or exchange. How well your teams maximize both of these opportunities may well determine your final holiday results.

Here's how to lead your team to post-holiday success.

1. Champion the incredible opportunities the post-season offers.

As a leader, you set the tone for the last week of the month. What you say and do determines if your staff will see customers with a return or an exchange as an opportunity or a potential problem.

Will your staff see each customer as someone who wants to treat herself to something special, or just another person looking for 75% off? Champion the right message and you'll have your team dialed in for success.

2. Focus on nailing what has made your store successful.

The post-holiday goal is no different than last week or last month: 1) Win every customer and 2) Maximize every opportunity. You do that in the post-season by:

- Attempting to turn every return into an exchange.

- Attempting to turn every exchange into a larger sale.

- Happily providing a refund if that is still the customer's wish after you take the two steps listed above.

- Viewing every customer who walks in the door as someone who is shopping for him/herself. Most customers are armed with gift cards, cash, and the desire to treat themselves to something.

- Using the same skills and behaviors that you did during the holidays, including not stopping the sale and selling what's in stock.

3. Keep the energy and fun levels high.

Not surprisingly, many teams are flat right after Christmas. The excitement of the holiday is over, and some people are just plain tired. The problem is that flat teams miss maximizing the rich post-season opportunities. It's up to you to make the work experience as exciting on December 26th as it was on December 20th. Run a game or contest. Be highly visible. Crank up your energy and your team will follow.

4. Proactively role-play and coach how to properly engage customers with returns.

There is an art to handling returns and turning a customer's chore into a wonderful and productive experience. Don't assume your staff knows how to do this. Take a few minutes to practice with each person before the start of his or her shift. That small time investment will pay off in both higher sales and ensuring your customers have a memorable (in a good way) experience.

So let me ask, are you ready to lead your team to post-holiday success? Your leadership could make an even bigger difference in post-holiday. When you have a couple minutes, write down a couple specific actions you'll take under each tip starting on Saturday.

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Doug Fleener, a proven retail and customer experience expert and speaker/consultant, helps companies dramatically improve their customer experience and their sales results. Visit the Dynamic Experiences Group website, or call Doug at 866-535-6331 to discuss how he can help you create extraordinary results. Learn about Doug's keynotes and workshops at DougFleener.com.

December 16, 2015

A survey by the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) found that between now and Christmas Day, consumers will visit a shopping center an average 6.5 times a week for goods and services, and will be spending, on average, $147.00 a week.

Some stores will get a little bit of that. Some stores will get their share. But the best retailers will get their share – and more. They’re going to crush it! Here are five tips to doing just that.

1. Greet every customer. You can't fall short on this. Customers need to see that you and your staff are right there, ready to deliver a great shopping (and buying) experience. This is especially important when the store is slammed. Otherwise customers will walk in, see the chaos, turn around and head for the hills. Or at least to another store, or home to shop online.

Consider designating a staffer to be the greeter during peak times. You might think you can't afford to not having everyone selling, but when it's crazy you actually can't afford to not have someone at the door.

2. Declare your store a No Clerk Zone. Customers are in your store to buy something. Most need to buy something for people on their list, and the rest are looking to add to what they’ve bought or buy something for themselves. I like to tell the staff to approach every customer as if the customer has walked in with their credit card in hand.

3. Be sure your staff engages EVERY customer with Who, not What. Being a No Clerk Zone means no closed-ended questions. No asking "how may I help you?" Associates need to welcome people and immediately ask for whom they are shopping. It's easy and it works. I believe keeping the entire focus on who the customer is shopping for, not what the customer is thinking of buying, is worth an extra 10% - 20% or more in sales. Really!

4. Make sure every employee has a winner’s attitude. Customers can feel the passion and energy of the store team (or lack thereof) when they're in the store. Everyone on the team needs to leave negativity and problems at the door. Managers and colleagues need to call out and turn around any staff member who isn't 100% onboard.

This is especially important for any stores and/or staff that are struggling this month. Last weekend’s warm weather affected a lot of stores. And the unseasonably warm weather doesn’t push out Christmas beyond December 25th. Sales are just going to be compressed into the next nine days. We all must be on top of our game...especially the leaders.

5. Run a simple crunch time sales incentive. One of my favorite incentives at this time of year is called The Double and Triple It Sales Incentive. I like this one because it keeps the staff focused on exceeding the daily sales goal as a team.

Here’s how one of our multi-store clients is using The Double and Triple It Sales Incentive program from December 15th to December 24th.

When the store hits the daily sales goal, everyone working that day earns $10. If they hit 105% of goal the payout doubles to $20. If they hit 110% of goal they triple it to $30. But if they fall short of goal, they don’t earn any money that day.

Of course you can change the sales targets and payouts to fit whatever is best for your business. You can use cash, store credit, or gift cards as the incentive.

So let me ask, which of these actions are you already taking? Which of these tips will you quickly apply so you’ll be sure to crush your sales goals?

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Doug Fleener, a proven retail and customer experience expert and speaker/consultant, helps companies dramatically improve their customer experience and their sales results. Visit the Dynamic Experiences Group website, or call Doug at 866-535-6331 to discuss how he can help you create extraordinary results. Learn about Doug's keynotes and workshops at DougFleener.com.

December 08, 2015

It is essential for every employee to maximize every customer opportunity this holiday. That's not terribly difficult when an associate works one-on-one with a customer, but it does get challenging when customers outnumber staff.

Unfortunately, many associates pull back when the store gets busy. They're fearful of getting "stuck" with a customer, so they slip into something perilously close to a clerking mode.

It is better to give five customers a very good experience than give one customer a great experience and disappoint four others. Working with multiple customers is an art, but it's an art that can be mastered. All it takes is effort and practice.

With only two weekends left before Christmas, it is vital for your success that your team knows how to sell - truly sell, not just clerk - to multiple customers. It might be the difference between exceeding your December sales goal - or missing it entirely.

That’s why I put this training together - and gave it away - two years ago. I’d like to offer it again at no charge. If you haven’t already, I highly encourage you to get your staff trained on multi-customer engagement in the next few days.

Here’s how.

First, download and print out the material. There is a manager's guide and an associates training sheet. Make a copy of the associates training material for each employee.

Next, roll out the material with each employee out as soon as possible. The goal is for the rollout itself to only take five minutes. Perfect for your Take Five meetings! You'll see that the concepts are pretty straightforward. Have the employees practice each element for the next few days.

The key to success is for you to debrief each employee at the end of his/her shift. The practice, and the incremental improvement, over the next week is where the payoff will happen. Again, here are the free trainings for download.

Best of luck, and a very Happy and Multi-Customer Holiday season for all!

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Doug Fleener, a proven retail and customer experience expert and speaker/consultant, helps companies dramatically improve their customer experience and their sales results. Visit the Dynamic Experiences Group website, or call Doug at 866-535-6331 to discuss how he can help you create extraordinary results. Learn about Doug's keynotes and workshops at DougFleener.com.

* Are competing strictly on price or product selection rather than an emotional connection with the customer.

* Don’t create and drive incremental store visits.

* Have an average staff that can’t – or won’t - capitalize on customer opportunities.

In short, average or below average retailers are in deep trouble.

There is no doubt that the brick and mortar pie is shrinking. But even given that reality, I believe that the above average store can substantially increase their share of the pie.

Ignore the press. Ignore the noise. Don’t focus on what sales are being lost to online shopping. Focus on driving your customers back into your store to experience your people and products. Do what you do best. Keep improving. Engage from the heart, and you’ll win the wallet.

Now for that coaching tip.

As a leader, it is essential that you help your people be better throughout the holidays. The busier we get, the more important your coaching becomes if you’re going to capture a bigger share of the pie.

Quick story. When I was a kid I had a neighborhood friend who loved to find four-leaf clovers. No matter what we were doing or where we were, she invariably found one. She was so lucky.

Not me. I could walk into a clover field and hours later emerge empty-handed. And of course, my children always found Waldo long before I did.

One day my neighbor told me how to find a four-leaf clover. She told me to stop looking at the whole field, and start focusing on one clover at a time. I distinctly remember thinking that that was impossible since there had to be a million clovers in the field.

But I took her advice, and started focusing on one clover at a time. Yes, you know what's coming next. Within a few minutes I found a four-leaf clover. And like Waldo in his red and white striped shirt, once I saw it I couldn't believe how much the four-leaf clover stood out from those around it.

The same holds true for helping your employees be more productive this holiday. You can't look at the entire "field" to find the opportunity. You have to narrow your focus. Find that one thing this week that will help them be even better and more productive than they were last week.

The worst thing we can do over the holidays is to stop helping our employees be better. The second worst thing we can do is to focus on too many things at once. You'll never discover the four-leaf clover if you're searching the entire field at once.

So let me ask, are you and your team doing what it takes to compete in today’s retail environment? Does each one of your employees know what they can and will do to deliver the best experience and maximize the customer opportunity?

Here’s how to use this article to impact your business

Pick one area of opportunity for each person every day. Bring that down to onevery specific action she/he will take to elevate her performance and results for the day. Your employees won't need a four-leaf clover to be successful. They'll be making their own luck.

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Doug Fleener, a proven retail and customer experience expert and speaker/consultant, helps companies dramatically improve their customer experience and their sales results. Visit the Dynamic Experiences Group website, or call Doug at 866-535-6331 to discuss how he can help you create extraordinary results. Learn about Doug's keynotes and workshops at DougFleener.com.